Before the Flock
by Auri the Awesome
Summary: Carsa is a mentally scarred Gen 23 avian-human hybrid-The first ever to be attempted. She is EIGHT percent avian, which comes with terrible consequences. She escaped the School at age eight, survived in the wild (presumed dead and a failure), and maintained her extensive knowledge. All this changes when she gets tired of being alone and barges into someone's backyard.
1. Lunacy Seeping

Carsa's eyelids, thick with dark eyelashes, shot open to reveal bright, scared, amber eyes.

As she came out of her stupor, she realized it was just a dream. At least it wasn't real _that _night.

She slowed her panting, attempting to steady her already fast heart. She clutched the branch she was sleeping on until her neck, chest, arms, legs, and **wings** untensed.

Her amber feathers were ruffled, literally.

Nightmares unnerved her. Thankfully, Carsa was tough-programmed to be tough, even. She frowned, playing with one of her wing's fluffy down. She could use a bath. Her feathers were becoming matted.

Thus the life of a runaway.

You see, Carsa escaped this dreaded "School:" A biogenetic testing facility in the middle of the desert. She was "Generation 23," or so they told her. Carsa was a...clever bird. The scientists, which she remembered as Needlers (since they found great pleasure in injecting formulas into her, no matter how much she begged them not to) once had great hopes for her.

Carsa would be a weapon: genetically programmed o be smarter, stronger, faster, and wiser than any human. Of course, they programmed her with flaws, so they could control their "weapon."

Sadly, their flaws weren't very controllable, either.

Carsa broke out of the School after they had taught her an excess amount of the world she would never get to live in. She ran for miles, her white shirt-and-capris uniform snagging on **everything** as she tried to outrun these **monsters** the lab had created. They were called Erasers. They were new. And Carsa had memorized the English dictionary well enough to know Erasers get rid of things, especially mistakes.

And, Carsa sighed admittedly in her mind as she thought of all this, that she was, indeed, a huge mistake.

Carsa could remember always being skinny (she was genetically designed that way) and underfed, but the past few years had made her even more lithe and scrawny. Carsa had de-evolved, she told herself. She had gone from the most evolved humanoid to animalistic. Sometimes, she talked to the birds and animals in human languages. But more often than not, she didn't talk at all. Truth be told, Carsa realized, she was crazy.

After the torture, testing, whole "you-are-an-abomination-against-nature" thing, and not fitting in anywhere (heck, Carsa growled mentally. She wasn't even part of the Animal Kingdom. There was no homo-avian.) Carsa had lost it. And hard.

She retained all of the training and teachings and **- Ack -** painful memories from her life. So, really, all she had lost was her sanity.

She was very smart. Too smart. The dirt-ridden girl nestled into the branch again. Slivers of moonlight hit her between the leaves, causing her metallic wings, hair, and eyes to shimmer. Another great thing about being eight percent avian, she thought, was the night vision and genetic coloring.

She was a pretty birdy.

**Pretty, tortured, crazy birdy...**

Carsa was gone.

She knew it.

That didn't mean she accepted it.


	2. Encounters

_**Sorry for the wait! :) As always, the Maximum Ride references and plots belong to James Patterson, not I. I do, however, own Carsa and Randy and this little storyline (except the School and all that jazz). See you at the bottom!**_

* * *

_And if the wind velocity is eight miles an hour, and there's an updraft above me stretching to a thousand feet, I should be able to fly at approximately ninety-two miles an hour…_

Carsa was keeping her mind active that cool morning, trying to ignore the drab feathers, slick with oil. Oil, you might ask? Carsa recently traveled to her usual makeshift birdbath—a good-sized lake with plenty of streams and fresh water. Upon reaching her hidden trail, an odd cry came from a creek. She ran towards it, curious, and found quite a few animals covered in black goo. Oil, her mind flashed information to her senses. _If it got on feathers, they would be of no use until cleaned…_

She dove in and saved everything she could, putting the animals on the riverbank and carrying the more coated ones to a clean stretch of lake, using human trash to bring the water to the animals instead of polluting the lake. After a few hours, her job was nearly complete on that end, and humans began arriving in loud, flashing cars. Police, government officials, her mind warned. Jerra attempted a takeoff, but fell through the underbrush limply. Her wings were black and dripping with the substance. She was stuck.

After a moment of panic and some quick thinking, Carsa ran off in the direction she usually hid. A bus station she knew closed that day, but had a window in the bathrooms that had no lock. She crept in silently, in case a janitor or other employee was around. It was, in fact, broad daylight. Four o'clock. Carsa had never sneaked in to a human place at such a time.

The showers creaked with rusty pipes as she turned the handle to start the flow of water. It came out cold, unbelievably so, but it didn't bother Carsa in the slightest. The lake was colder. The nights in her trees were colder. Carsa was no measly human, in need of a warm fire and blankets and company. She was just fine embracing her inner bird. Though sometimes she regretted it when a mouse passed underneath her perch.

She heard a car drive up and froze, immediately shutting down the water. The windows sent yellow-orange light that made the cleaned portions of Carsa's wings shine. She gulped, scrambling for her clothing and using her dirtied shirt to wipe off as much oil as possible. Shrugging the ragged cloth over her head, she pushed her wings through the slits in the back and crawled out the window, leaving a trail of petroleum.

Carsa was dangerously in the sky for less than two minutes, and soon was forced to make a crash landing in a grove. She stumbled to a tree and scurried up lithely, pulling herself from one branch to the next. Carsa hadn't even had time to steal any food from the front. Her stomach growled. It looked like she'd eat the old-fashioned way. She sighed, getting comfortable in the tree, and waited for something to pass underneath.

Carsa had not expected a human boy to walk beneath her, calling out, "Lucy, Pepper, Maggie! C'mere girls!" Barks came from the distance. Carsa turned white with terror. The boy might not look up, but the dogs would catch her scent if given the opportunity, and there was a trail of faint oil from where she landed to where she climbed the tree…

Carsa just about died inside when three large hunting/retrieving dogs loped into view, and did, in fact, find her lungs and brain stopped working when the teenager looked at the oil at his feet curiously, eyes following the trail…

"No, no, no, no, no, no," she chanted, pulling her limbs in as much as possible and covering her eyes with her tainted hands.

"Hey!" The boy yelled, "Is someone up there?" Carsa shrieked quietly, nearly falling out of the tree. "You lost a shoe down here!" Carsa peered over the edge, enough to see her left ruined sneaker in the boy's hand. Her foot was bare. "Come down, I promise the dogs don't bite anything but hunting birds!"

Carsa decided to try her luck. Seeing no other way out than asking the boy to leave and forget he saw her, since she had no nice method of erasing his memories, Carsa called, "That's not exactly reassuring, you know? What if I'm wearing a feathered vest?"

The boy paused for a moment, trying to find the girl who spoke to him. "Well, unless you're part duck, they'll leave synthetic feathers alone. It's all about the animal, wild smell. They don't chase rubber ducks."

Carsa could've moaned. "I have a pet bird, and I just went swimming in a pond full of ducks. They'll attack, trust me."

"I'll tell them not to."

"Reasoning isn't what I desire at present. I am politely asking you to leave, so I can retrieve my shoe."

"I are you telling me to get lost?"

"No, find a trail and follow it. Just head a distant direction."

"Well, ma'am, since you've given me no name, this just so happens to be my backyard. My family owns the next twenty acres of land. Why don't you come down and we'll figure out why you're hiding from me. Poaching, perhaps?"

"We could be civilized about this," Carsa croaked, wishing she had given her voice more practice in case of an incident like this.

"Humans aren't civilized."

"Courteous, then? You're carrying a large weapon, and have three dogs that are likely to attack me before I leave this tree. If you don't mind, I will stay here until you leave."

"You're gonna be treed for a while, then, birdy. I'm not leaving till you get down from the nest." He smirked at his own wit. "Oh, my name's Randy, by the way. That's short for Randell. I might be persuaded to leave sooner if you tell me your name, bird."

Carsa pondered for a moment. What names did she know? "You can refer to me as Bird," she said. Randy scoffed, switching hands for his shotgun.

"That's my cat's name, pal. I want a real name."

"Would Avis suffice?"

"Is it short for your real name?" He asked.

"Possibly."

"Nope." She sat down as let his dogs lick him. "This is kinda interesting. I've never treed a bird before."

"Consider it a first time," Carsa muttered. "Alright, Randell. Since you seem to be an expert to when someone is lying or not, my name is Carsa."

"Carsa?" He asked, leaning back, looking up.

"Carsa," she nodded, forgetting he couldn't see her.

"Alrighty then, Carsa, my next question is where are you?"

"In a tree, obviously."

"I knew that," Randy rolled his eyes, "I meant, which tree? Come down a few branches so I can see you."

"No thank you, Randell."

"Carsa, I won't ask again," he loaded his gun. "You see, I brought plenty of rounds, and in case you didn't know, shotguns release loads of pellets, so all I have to do is aim, and it'll hit all over the place. I'll get you down eventually."

"I am in the tree directly in front of you, and I implore you do not attempt to shoot me down."

"You talk funny, Carsa." He put the gun down and lay flat on his back. "Are you from a different country?"

"No."

"I'm getting a bit tired of these long-answer questions," Randy drawled. "And I wouldn't have shot you, but the way."

"Thank you, extremely reassuring."

"What I'm here for," he grinned. "But I do need to know what you're here for."

"I was hiding from someone."

"Why?"

"I may have gotten into trouble."

"Doing what?"

"I'd prefer you knew as little on the matter as possible, Randell."

"Call me Randy, Carsa. Way cooler sounding."

"Randy, allow me to leave, or I will have to take measures that put you at risk."

"Well, I've got a gun, so I'm not in too much danger."

"That's not how I wanted you to interpret that."

"Could you speak normally?" He asked. "And, hey, I think I see you. God, you got up high enough, didn't you? How are those branches holding you?"

"I am lighter than I appear."

"Seeing as I can't see you all that well, I wouldn't know. How old are you, Carsa?"

"Fifteen, approximately."

"Me too," he laughed. "That's great. So, we're the same age, we know each other's names, and by the sound of it, you're a lot smarter than I am, Car, so you might as well mosey on down so I can return your slipper, Cinderella."

Carsa scowled a moment, not understanding the reference. "You promise the dogs will not attack?"

"It'd be kinda hard, with you in the tree and them on the ground." His accent bothered her. It wasn't country, like the words he used, but it didn't sound like her pronunciation. "Are you from up North by any chance, Carsa? I have a friend from Boston who says stuff like you do."

"I have never been to Boston," Carsa said automatically, "So, no, I am not from the area."

"Start climbing down, now, please." Carsa sighed, looking herself over. She attempted to hide her wings under her shirt, but blackened ends stuck out. It looked like dripping oil, though, so he might not notice. Carsa began to climb down.

"There we go!" Randy grinned, hopping to his feet. "Uh, are you okay, Car? What kind of trouble did you say you'd gotten into?"

"Nothing that concerned you," she replied, glancing down to find the next branch.

"Well, your appearance concerns me," Randy said smoothly. "You look like road kill, two weeks in."

"I feel that could be taken as an insult."

"Didn't really mean it that way." He said, looking at her with false bashfulness. "But, God, is that oil? Where'd that come from? It's bad to breathe that stuff in, and to touch it unless it's been processed to use in lotion or something. You should probably get cleaned up."

Carsa stopped her descent ten feet up, and let her legs dangle over a branch. "I am quite capable of removing the oil by my own means, but thank you for caring."

He stared at her in wonder. "You look mighty pretty for the clothing you're wearing. Did you go dumpster diving?"

"You just managed to compliment then insult me in the same sentence," Carsa mused. "Humans are interesting."

"You're prime example of that, bird," he gestured to her above him. "Want your shoe back?"

"If you don't mind," she said lightly.

"Actually, I do kinda mind, because it's filled with holes. My sister left some junk in her room before she went off to boarding school, and I bet it's the same size as you, if not a bit wider." He looked at her appraisingly. "I didn't know we had toothpick-boned humans."

"I am not made of toothpicks."

"I got that much, bird." He sighed. Carsa glanced at the dogs, which were too busy playing with each other and attacking grasshoppers to notice her.

"I'll take my shoe back, please." She reached down, but Randy held it under her reach.

"Nuh uh uh," he grinned. "This is great. I haven't messed with anyone since my brother moved out."

"Please, Randy," she stared at him imploringly.

"Whoa," he stepped back. "I didn't really notice it before, but are you wearing contacts? Your eyes are super-amber."

"Uh, yes, I am." She looked away, blocking his view of her eyes with her brown-highlighted-in-amber hair. "You are persistent at delaying my departure."

"Heck yeah I am," he smirked. "Actually, I think I'm gonna keep your shoe. It'll be at my house, if you want it back. By all means, stop by. It's just me and my Dad, and he's currently out selling cows 'n stuff. Just me and the dogs," he smiled, picking up the gun and walking away. "And the cat. A mile to the east, if you wanna find it. There's a trail."

With a whistle, the dogs ran after him. All four creatures disappeared into the woods.

Carsa sat paralyzed on her branch, brain going through all that just happened. "Oh. My. I've been caught." She murmured, unfocused hawk eyes staring distantly. "And stolen from."

She scowled in the direction the boy went. "If it's just him," she thought, trying to keep her mind from panicking and going into shock from the fact that **people **(at least one or two)** now knew she existed**. "Perhaps it won't be too disastrous."

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**Please comment, review, favorite, and follow if you haven't! Critiques are always welcome here! :) Thank you for reading, and a shoutout to all you guys who were so wonderful as to follow my story right off the bat! You guys are the best!**

**-Auri the Awesome**


	3. Decision

Carsa looked at the house like she was waiting for it to jump up and digest her whole. Which, considering her background, was more likely than one would think. She sighed deeply, looking around the cabin-esque features of the giant building. Glass doors. Wooden logs. Balconies. A view of the forest. Very nice, if not a little intimidating.  
Carsa paused, unsure what to do. Pulling every thought she could from her unbearable past,

she trudged towards it.

"Randy?" She calls quietly, wanting to see another human, but in the same sense not wanting to be seen.

"Randy, are you there?"

She scowls with her amber-hawk eyes.

"Carsa?" She hears a muffled call. She glances up at the log balcony to see a sliding door open, and Randell hops out with much enthusiasm.

"Car!" He grinned. "That was sooner than I expected."

"Hello, Randy." She looks at him with concern. Randy notices how bright and unusual her eyes are.

"Why don't we hose you down first?" Randy says, looking at her. "Then you can come in and take a shower. I've already found my sister's old clothes."

Carsa went through her mental dictionary.

"Hose?" She scowled.

Randy grinned. "Yup.

Hose."

* * *

Five minutes later, Carsa was extremely unhappy as the boy sprayed her off, but her tanned skin finally appeared from underneath the mud, and Randy lowered the nozzle. "Well, hey, you have skin under that mud." Carsa scowled.  
"Are you suggesting otherwise?"

Randy shrugged in defeat. "Of course not. I'm just saying you couldn't have been dirtier. Which leads me to ask, why is an admittably attractive girl like you doing running around the woods? Are you a runaway?"

"…Yes." _Technically,_ she thought_, it's not a lie_.

"Oh. Wanna call your parents?" He offered, leaning towards the house. "I have a phone inside you can use."

"No." She immediately snapped. "No thank you, Randy."

"…Okay." He paused, rocking on the balls of his feet. "Oh! Yeah! Come on inside, and you can take that shower. I have some stuff laid out, figured you wouldn't be too picky." He began walking inside. Then he realized she wasn't behind him. "Well, you have to follow me, Carsa. Unless you can teleport."

"I cannot teleport." She answered.  
"Well then, gee, what's keeping you from coming? Hurry up, slowpoke."

She followed him diligently.

* * *

Warm water hurt, but it was a good pain. Carsa sat on the tiles of the small shower, head in her hands, breathing deeply. She liked things like this. Showers. Food. Clothes. Humans invented some very comfortable things. She sat there in deep thought for a while, but made sure not to surpass ten minutes. She remembered reading somewhere the adequate time for a shower was ten minutes.

Combing her hair out in front of the steamy mirror, Carsa admired her reflection. She couldn't help it; birds and humans were both generally narcissistic. She was scrawny, from build and starvation (though, actually, she ate _extremely _well) and her wings were an amber puff behind her, wrapped in the towels given to wrap the rest of her. She stood there, playing with her chocolate brown feathery-hair (streaked with amber feathers somehow, she was sure it was a defect) as she stared lazily into her own piercing eyes. She was pretty, if an abomination to the world and society. She didn't care.

"Carsa?" Randy asked, knocking on the door. "Just making sure you didn't drown."

"I did not drown, Randy," Carsa replied in her singsong voice. Bird song. Carsa wondered if she could whistle. She'd try later.

"Okay. Are you hungry? I can make cereal or something." She smiled at the mirror at his attempts of hospitality. Her orange eyes flickered.

"Thank you, Randy. I would like that." Not to be narcissistic, but to be practical, Carsa opened her wings as much as she could and ruffled them, trying to dry them off. She was soon enveloped with soggy metallic feathers. She flapped them out. They were still damp. That would show on the shirt. He would see.

Carsa then was forced to ask herself, _Do I care if he sees?_

She jumped to the counter-question:

_Don't I want that?_

* * *

**Thank you for reading/reviewing/following! :D It's much appreciated by me. I love writing for you guys, it gives a sense of pride knowing SOMEONE out there likes your work. I'll try to update more often. **

**-Auri**


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